https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/17/5-things-to-know-before-the-stock-market-opens-tuesday-aug-17.html
美聯社援引消息人士的話報導稱，預計美國衛生專家將建議所有年齡段的美國人在接受第二劑疫苗八個月後接受加強注射。該報告稱，預計最早將於本週發布關於加強注射的公告。隨著 delta 變體的蔓延，全國各地的新病例增加，該建議將出台。上週末，五個州創造了新的 Covid 病例記錄。
2021年8月17日 星期二
2020年8月2日 星期日
誰應該首先接種Covid-19疫苗？這比您想像的要棘手
關鍵點
- 全球衛生組織呼籲採取公平公正的程序來確定疫苗的分配方式。
- 為近80億人接種疫苗不會在一夜之間發生。
- 誰先接種疫苗？我們請生物倫理學家考慮一下。
The hunt is on for a vaccine for Covid-19, which has killed more than 600,000 people.
The current frontrunners include an mRNA vaccine from Moderna; a candidate vaccine from AstraZeneca and Oxford University; a Chinese vaccine from the military and biotech company CanSigo Biologisc; and an mRNA-based vaccine from German company BioNTech and Pfizer.
While a candidate could be approved this year, it remains to be seen whether the vaccine will confer temporary or long-term immunity, or how many doses will be required, as doubling the number of jabs could complicate worldwide immunization efforts.
But bioethicists and public health experts all agree that manufacturing doses for 8 billion people quickly is an insurmountable challenge.
So someone will have to decide who should get the vaccine first — and why.
In the United States, committees have begun to form to discuss this tricky issue. An advisory committee of external health experts is advising the Centers for Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on an equitable framework. The National Academies of Medicine announced earlier this month that its committee will “develop an overarching framework to assist policymakers in the U.S. and global health communities.”
Some of the most challenging questions they face include whether pregnant women (normally the last to get a vaccine) should be higher up on the list, or whether Black and Latino people — who have been disproportionately affected by the virus — should get access to the vaccine before the rest of the population.
Then there are the global considerations. Task forces have formed to come up with a “fair and equitable” framework to distribute the vaccine between countries, but face numerous practical challenges.
Arthur Caplan, professor of bioethics at New York University Langone Medical Center, thinks some countries will have vaccines to spare, while others won’t have access to many at all. Some nations could use their leverage over vaccines as a way to curry favor or to negotiate trade deals. Enforcing safety and efficacy is another sticking point because not every country has the same quality-control processes.
“Internationally, there’s a lot of talk about how every life is valuable,” he said. “But that doesn’t address what you do in practical terms if there’s a shortage.”
Caplan is also concerned about the rise of black markets, which might allow rich people in certain countries to jump the line and buy vaccines for themselves and their families.
Other bio-ethicists note complicated questions around responsibility and need. For instance, countries like New Zealand have done a very good job at flattening the curve, while others like Brazil are struggling to contain active outbreaks. So should the countries that have largely stamped out Covid-19 vaccinate their populations last?
“We need to think through how to distribute vaccines to reduce harm internationally,” said Ezekiel Emanuel, an oncologist and senior fellow at the Center for American Progress. “And some countries are really suffering more than others.”
So who gets the vaccine first?
Within the U.S., bioethicists hope that vaccines are distributed in a centralized and coordinated way. Back in April and May, the lack of coordination from the federal government meant that states had to compete for supplies, including ventilators, and manufacturers were confused about where to send equipment.
“I’m worried that there will not be the kind of national leadership on the issue that we need to avoid fights from breaking out as people jockey to get access,” said Michelle Mello, professor of law and medicine at Stanford University.
Even if the federal government steps up, there isn’t yet consensus on who should get access to the vaccines first.
Most of the experts had a set of categories in mind. Lawrence Gostin, a professor of global health law and director of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law at Georgetown, helped draft policy papers on the issue for the Obama administration during the H1N1 crisis of 2009.
His strategy would be using the vaccine first to prevent further spread of the virus.
“That is, we might need a kind of ring vaccination strategy for major clusters of cases that don’t we want to spread to other other cities or states,” he said.
Next, he would prioritize health workers on the front lines of the pandemic. Once they’re vaccinated inside hospitals, he would turn his attention to other essential workers, including police, sanitation workers, and workers who are critical to maintaining our food supply. Then he’d select the most vulnerable, including the elderly or marginalized populations or those with pre-existing conditions.
Other experts have different ideas.
Nisarg Patel, a surgeon at UC San Francisco and a co-author of an op-ed on the topic, would start with the people at highest risk, including health workers, essential municipal workers, vulnerable groups and the elderly.
But given that nearly half of Americans have at least one chronic illness, there might need to be some consideration about who gets prioritized within that group. For instance, should immunocompromised patients in the midst of cancer treatment get access to the vaccine before tens of millions of people with Type 2 diabetes?
“The way you think through them is to think through the outcomes,” said Mello, although she notes the evidence is still accumulating on that. She also points out, however, that it might be the case that not everyone will want the vaccine immediately - so some might wait and see what happens with the first cohort.
Even then, it’s not that simple.
Bioethicists point out that some of these decisions can only really be made once the specifics of the vaccine are better understood.
Vulnerable populations including the frail and elderly might not mount a robust immune response to the vaccine, for instance. The data on that from clinical trials is still limited. And health care workers might not get first dibs if they have sufficient PPE to protect themselves. The first round might be limited to those who treat Covid-19 patients specifically.
“A lot will depend on the vaccine, but also the modeling that we do,” said Emanuel. “We might even find that the best way to reduce the spread of the virus is to vaccinate the most common transmitters, like grocery store workers or policemen,” he said.
How about the anti-vaxxers? (someone who does not agree with vaccinating people (= giving them injections to prevent disease), especially parents who do not want their children to be vaccinated:)
Another question that will need to be determined by committees: If sufficient people aren’t willing to volunteer for a vaccine, should governments require that certain groups get vaccinated?
“Voluntary is always better,” said Emanuel. “It’s never the first option to mandate it, but it may be a necessary one.”
Caplan agrees that discussions should be underway on this issue, as a lot of people might be reluctant to get vaccinated. Anti-vaccination sentiment is far from limited to the United States, he points out. In countries like France, surveys have shown that 1 in 3 people do not feel that vaccines are safe.
Caplan doesn’t have a clear solution for hardline anti-vaxxers, who might never be willing to get the vaccine. But he does think that a lot can be done to sway those who are reluctant or hesitant by showing data from the first group that gets vaccinated. In the United States, he would message to the public that vaccination is required for certain freedoms, like travel or sending their kids to school. Emanuel suggests that public health workers might even consider teaming up with celebrities and influencers to help spread the word.
These challenges — and many more surrounding vaccine allocation — are surmountable with the right planning and coordination, Emanuel stresses.
“We shouldn’t give up,” he said.
2020年3月18日 星期三
搶疫苗技術，德媒爆料川普重金收買德國生物製藥公司
防疫如同戰爭，現在除了暫停國內一切活動，杜絕跨國往來，還要展開疫苗大戰。據德國政府證實的消息，美國總統川普試圖招募致力於治療冠狀病毒的德國科學家，並提供大量資金以確保美國擁有疫苗技術的專屬權。
|
德國報紙 WELT am
Sonntag 根據德國政府消息人士揭露這項消息，指川普正在努力為美國，重點是僅針對美國，尋找一種冠狀病毒疫苗。
川普提供巨額資金，鎖定德國生物製藥公司 CureVac，希望他們將總部搬遷到美國，並提供疫苗專有權。CureVac 與德國政府擁有的保羅埃里希 (Paul
Ehrlich Institute) 疫苗和生物醫學研究所合作，共同治療冠狀病毒。
CureVac 預計在 6、7 月前準備好一種實驗性疫苗，拿到許可後可以開始進行人體測試。而且低劑量疫苗可能可以適合在 CureVac 現有設施內進行批量生產。
據稱 CureVac 執行長已經應邀到白宮與川普會面，討論生產冠狀病毒疫苗的戰略和機會。德國政府相信消息的真實性，表示將全力阻止這項交易，提供財務獎勵讓 CureVac 留在德國。
德國官員表示，將研究團隊移至美國，等於將工作置於德國管轄範圍之外，會妨礙德國應對疫情的戰略。德國政府已禁止出口一些用於管理冠狀病毒流行的醫療設備。
去年，挪威一家非營利組織，流行病防備創新聯盟 (CEPI) 向 CureVac 提供 3,400 萬美元，支持疫苗技術的發展，該技術涉及使用被稱為 mRNA 的遺傳物質，包裹在稱為固體脂質奈米粒中。這些類型的疫苗旨在指導人體細胞製造類似於目標病毒的蛋白部分，這些蛋白不會感染而是觸發免疫反應。CureVac 最近宣佈成功研發狂犬病疫苗，僅用兩劑 1 微克劑量就可以保護人類免於染病。
一些公共衛生專家認為，這種較新的疫苗技術是應對新興傳染病的理想之選，因為與傳統疫苗相比，這種疫苗可以設計，並且初批生產的速度要快得多，傳統疫苗可能要花費數年的時間。CEPI 今年一月同意向 CureVac 再提供高達 830 萬美元的資金，用於開發冠狀病毒疫苗。CureVac 的投資方還有比爾和梅琳達蓋茨基金會。
CureVac 是研發新型冠狀病毒疫苗的幾家公司之一。位於美國馬薩諸塞州劍橋市的 Moderna 公司正在使用類似技術，並且已經為在西雅圖進行的人體研究提供一批實驗性冠狀病毒疫苗。但是該技術尚未得到充分驗證，因為世界上還沒有正式用於人類的 mRNA 疫苗。
|
訂閱：
文章 (Atom)